London has been battered by 50mph winds that have felled trees and caused travel chaos. Powerful gusts swept across the capital as the Met Office issued a yellow "be aware" weather alert for most of the country.

Hundreds of extra London hotel rooms have come back on the market with 79 days to go before the Olympics according to Holiday Inn and Crowne Plaza owner, InterContinental Hotels Group.

Richard Solomons, chief executive of IHG, said: “Originally two-thirds of rooms in 35 of our London hotels went to Locog as part of our support for the Games. Locog has just given us 20% of those rooms back and they are back on general sale. Demand is high.”

Solomons is also excited that Holiday Inn is running the 15,000-strong athletes village and said: “It has already hugely raised awareness of the brand.” IHG has just opened a Staybridge Suites, pictured, and Holiday Inn at Westfield Stratford.

First-quarter profits rose 5% to $118 million (£73 million) — slightly above City forecasts — with revenue per available room rising 7%. The strongest drivers were China and North America but Europe, where IHG runs hotels primarily in Northern countries, also performed “robustly in a challenging market.”

Solomons said that during April, revenues per room had risen by 6.1% with 4.2% of that coming from increased rates. He said: “In some developed countries it is getting harder to build new hotels so the rates the existing ones can charge are being pushed upwards.”